


Light

by theironyofchokingonalightsabre



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-02-01
Updated: 2014-02-01
Packaged: 2018-01-10 19:22:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 6,015
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1163518
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theironyofchokingonalightsabre/pseuds/theironyofchokingonalightsabre
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tony's father experimented on him before he was born</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> yo so this is a chaptered fic im working on, ive already written about 7 chapters which i will add like every day, its a bit weird but im hoping its original so yeah enjoy  
> i dont own anything except the plot and any characters you dont recognise  
> there may be a few scenes with a little bit of blood or stuff idk but nothing tooooo graphic

My dad fucked me up real bad. You've all heard stories before, abusive fathers, neglected, blah blah blah. But seriously, your dad being the cause of a genetic mutation that stops you from doing a hell of a lot of things? Its a new one. And who would have thought it? The great Tony Stark, the genius, billionaire, world famous Tony Stark, has a condition that means he can't survive in the dark. I don't know what he did. The test records were lost. But he was messing around with genetic modification, trying to create humans that were stronger, probably. Just another weapon. I've looked, and I'm pretty sure I've got plant DNA in there somewhere, which means that if I don't have light, my body starts to shut down. I don't know how it works, and I don't know why Howard did it, but I have tested and it is incredibly, excruciatingly painful to be in the dark.

The other test subjects had it worse, though. He must have promised the pregnant mothers a lot of money for their unborn children to have an untested drug pumped into them. Some of them got animal genes, others plants. I don't know the specifics. There was one though, one I managed to get the records for. They had been injected with a cow gene, Howard was trying to get more muscle or something. When they were born, they looked regular, just a large baby. It was the most promising of all the test subjects at the time. But, when it got to about three months old, it's form started to change. There were pictures. It was disgustingly ugly, the face twisted and it was clear that it had trouble breathing. Its back became hunched and, as hoped, it grew more muscle than an ordinary human. However, its legs were too weak and it had brittle bones, meaning it couldn't move anywhere. The child died before it had reached six months.

I was the last test subject in Howard's cruel experiment. My mother told him she was pregnant, then he injected me with the serum without her knowing. I don't know how he did it, but she found out eventually, and I'm pretty sure she set fire to all his records, making sure he never did an experiment like this again. I grew up normal in appearance, with my mother trying to convince herself that when I coughed blood every night, it was because of an abnormally bad fear of the dark. I don't know how she did that, and I don't know how I even got through my childhood without dying. However, that was the past, and now I'm here. Part of the Avengers, and hey, it's great! But still, no one knows of my condition. I have to have precautions in the tower, where we all live now. My floor has huge windows and the balcony, and inside there are huge lights hidden away in case of emergencies. The lights in the tower are on constantly, even though natural light definitely is better for me.

I don't get much sleep.


	2. Chapter 2

"Tony. Tony. Tony. Tony."

Tony grumbled and sat up in bed, squinting his eyes. He looked around, to see no one in his room.

"Tooonnnnyyyyy."

He rubbed his eyes, there was still nobody.

"I'm up here, dumbass"

Looking up, he saw a head peeking through the vent.

"I watched you sleep, Tony..."

Tony rolled his eyes and flopped back onto the mattress. "Okay, bye now, Clint."

"But Steve said you should come for breakfast."

He flipped his middle finger at the rough direction of the voice.

"He's gonna kick your ass."

He pulled the sheets over his head.

"Thor will eat your pancakes  _then_  Steve will kick your ass..."

Tony grumbled then got out of bed reluctantly, dragging his feet to the door. He heard a faint tap on metal as Hawkeye scrambled through the vents. As he walked into the kitchen, he saw the other Avengers sitting around the table with a pile of steaming pancakes in front of each person.

"Tony! You finally decided to have some food, I'd say its been about 36 hours now?" Steve said. If it had come from anyone else it would have sounded joking, but Steve sounded genuinely concerned, which was weird because they still weren't exactly the best of friends.

"Um, I had some Hershey's yesterday?" Tony shrugged and sat down, helping himself to the feast in front of him. Steve rolled his eyes but dropped the subject, knowing he couldn't change Tony's eating habits no matter how hard he tried.

"So, what's going on today?" Tony asked, his mouth stuffed with pancake.

As the only one without his or her mouth full, Bruce answered, "Group training at four, apart from that we are free all day."

"Group training, are you kidding me? We are fucking great."

"Don't argue with me, argue with Fury." Tony stopped arguing, as no one argued with Fury and got away with it without being called a motherfucker at least three times.

After the food had all been eaten, the group split up, some going to the gym, others to the labs. Tony, of course, went to his workshop. He had been there for around nine hours, working on his suit, before he was disturbed by anybody. Steve had walked in with a cup of coffee and was standing right beside him before Tony jumped and fell off his chair in surprise.

"Shit, Steve, I didn't see you there." He said, sitting on the floor.

"Um yeah, I realised..." Steve helped him up again and stood there awkwardly.

"Did you have a purpose for this visit...?"

"Oh yeah, did you want anything to eat? I brought you coffee but..." Steve gestured to the hot liquid which was now in a puddle on the floor. "I'll clean that up then go..."

Tony shrugged. "Dum-e or Butterfingers can do it. And don't worry about anything, I've got supplies down here."

Sighing, Steve replied, "Tony you have a coffee machine. You still need to eat."

"Not as much as you regular hum-" Tony realised he had slipped up and stopped talking.

Steve ignored him though, grabbing a cloth off the workbench and mopping up the spilled drink. "Just because you are used to long periods of time with only coffee, doesn't mean you can just stop eating. I'll bring you down something, then I want to see what you are working on."

Tony grinned. Everyone else usually stayed away from his inventing, as one time Thor asked what he was doing and three hours later the Asgardian appeared from the workshop covered in oil and with an extensive knowledge on how the repulsors on Tonys suit worked.

"AVENGERS ASSEMBLE!"

It was half past three in the morning, and the alarm went off around the tower. Tony was still up, working on his lasers in the light of his workshop, but he rolled his eyes and quickly made his way up to find the others.

The mission was easy really. Giant robot spiders in Florida, find the base, shut it down, easy peasy, don't get killed. Tony and Thor flew off quickly, with the others following in a quin-jet. When they were all there, they performed like clockwork, some fighting off the enemy while others helped get civilians to safety. It only took fifteen minutes for Captain America to be able to get to the power source and shut it down, killing all the spiders. It was going fine, until the building where the spiders had been produced stood up, turning into a giant arachnid with some crazy guy at the controllers. Black Widow took care of him quickly, jumping off another building into the cockpit of the robotic spider and knocking him out. They all thought it would be a simple clean up operation after that, but the spider seemed to be able to function on its own, and started trying to eliminate its enemy. A claw grabbed Natasha and flung her away, causing her to smack into the side of a building, Hulk catching her on the way down. The next target to be taken down was Captain America. Red lasers started shooting out of the spider's eyes, ricocheting off the vibranium shield. One of the rebounding laser beams hit the spider, which caused it to stumble, allowing Captain America to run in, jumping up and pulling out all the wires he could see. The robot spasmed and fell to the ground.

"Hell fucking yeah!" Hawkeye exclaimed.

"Never liked spiders..." Grumbled Tony.

They all looked around, surveying the damage.

"WHERE IS THE GOOD CAPTAIN?" boomed Thor loudly.

Tony dropped to floor level."Shit. He was in the spider." That was when they heard it. A small beeping coming from the spider. Then they saw a red light. Beep. Beep. Beep.

"Aw crap."

Flying in, he grabbed Steve's unconscious body and made his way out, finding it to be blocked by a fallen bar. "Sir, there is 10% power remaining, Mark 45 wasn't designed for this much airborne travel."

Outside, Hulk whispered "Boom."


	3. Chapter 3

He opened his eyes slowly. It was bright, so he was probably in his workshop. Taking a sniff, he realised it was too clean to be there. Realising where he was, he shut his eyes again.  
"Tony! You're awake!" He heard a voice, Clint's.  
"Leave him, he's had to recover a lot." That was Natasha's.  
"He's had like, three days asleep to recover."  
There was a thumping sound.  
"Owww, that was uncalled for, but okay I'll leave him alone." He heard the door shut, then opened his eyes.  
"Three days, huh? How's Steve? Also, why am I in the hospital?" Tony glanced around, he could see Bruce and Thor outside the room, but Steve wasn't anywhere to be seen.  
"Um, he got some bad burns, but he's almost healed now. He just went to get lunch." Natasha threw a sandwich towards him.  
Tony unwrapped it, taking a bite. "So, fill me in."  
"Well, I don't know how much you remember but you flew out after the spider exploded, but then you crashed and then you were flown to the helicarrier hospital ward with Steve, and you were both unconscious. You were showing signs of healing until the night, when you started to cough blood and your skin went funny. Some dumbass doctor said it could be the height, which is stupid because you fly everywhere, but they sent you here, and in the morning you improved, but then you went downhill in the night again. Then it was this morning, and you woke up. They aren't really sure what's up with you." Natasha shrugged.  
Tony bit his lip.  
"How, um... How dark was it in my room?"  
Natasha raised her eyebrows. "As dark as it is in any room at night? Why?"  
"No reason..."  
Natasha sighed, but dropped the subject.  
"Drink lots of water, take your pills after you eat, get some rest, heal, blah blah you know what to do." She stood up and walked out, shutting the door gently. As soon as she was out of sight, Tony leapt up and threw open the curtains, his headache that he had previously had disappearing quickly. He knew why his health had deteriorated during the nights but he wasn't planning on telling anyone soon. Hearing footsteps from down the corridor, Tony slid back into the bed.  
Steve knocked on the door then came in.  
"You're awake!"  
"Yes, the hero of the year is with this world again."  
Steve scratched his head, "Yeah...thanks for that..."  
Tony rolled his eyes. "I'm sensing a but."  
"You really shouldn't have gone in there! You knew you had low power, why didn't you get Hulk or Thor to get some of the metal out the way? Or just leave me there, I would have been fine!"  
Tony fake yawned. "Look, I don't want to see anyone dead, and no one is dead. Now go throw up some blood and then you'll know how I'm feeling."  
Steve sat down. "Yeah, what's with that? Skin discolouration, coughing blood and major weight loss, but only at night. You should probably talk to Bruce about that..."  
Tony snorted. "I don't think Bruce would understand what's up with me."  
"So you do know what's up?"  
"No...he's a radiation expert, not a crappy ass illness expert so he probably won't know."  
Steve stood up again. "I should go. Please Tony, don't do something reckless like that again. The team couldn't take the loss of you." He turned around, and as he walked out of the door, he realised that although the team wouldn't be able to deal with the loss of Iron Man, what was more important was that Steve Rogers wouldn't be able to deal with the loss of Tony Stark.


	4. Chapter 4

It was the next week, and Steve and Tony had fully recovered. Natasha was still suspicious towards Tony, but every time she tried to get him alone so she could talk to him, he would make a quick excuse and run off to a lab or his workshop. Another week had passed before the assassin finally cornered him.  
"Tony." She said, sitting down next to him in his workshop, where he was working on some blueprints.  
"Um, I have to...feed the...dog...no...Steve...no, dog...um...both?" Tony stood up quickly, but Natasha jabbed him in the leg, making him sit quickly back down again, wincing in pain.  
"Shit, ow, okay." He rubbed the sore spot on his leg, rolling his eyes. "You didn't need to be that violent."  
"Yes, I did. You've been making stupid excuses about dogs or Steve for two weeks now. When were you planning on telling me what you know?"  
"Know about what exactly? Oh yeah, I'm getting Steve a dog for his birthday, what do you think he'll prefer, a retriever or a sausage dog?"  
"Tony."  
"Because he probably wants a retriever but I want a sausage dog so I don't kno-ow, ow!" He shut up promptly.  
Natasha sighed. "I don't care what dog you are getting him, what I care about is this shit going on with you and the dark."  
"I need a pee..."  
"Tony."  
"I need caffeine."  
"Tony."  
"I need food."  
"Tony."  
"Shit, Natasha, okay, I need light constantly to survive because my dad messed with my fucking genes!"  
Natasha shrugged. "Okay. I guessed it was something like that. I just needed you to say it yourself." She stood up to leave, but Tony grabbed her arm.  
"Natasha, you can't tell anyone. Not Clint, not Fury, not Bruce. They can't help me. Just..." He sighed, letting go of her arm. "No one, okay?"  
She nodded, then walked out.  
Tony closed his eyes, then put his head in his hands.

Steve found Tony later on the balcony, an empty glass in his hand.  
"Tony."  
"Do you prefer retrievers or sausage dogs?"  
"How many drinks have you had?"  
"It was a genuine question, but I don't know...lots?"  
Steve raised his eyebrows. "Tony, you said you'd stop drinking."  
"I did stop. Now I've started again." He looked at the glass, then threw it forcefully over the wall. "I LIKE IT, ANOTHER! See, I did Thor there."  
Steve ran to the edge, trying to spot where the object landed.  
"Tony! That could kill someone!"  
Shrugging, Tony replied "Steeeeeve, it's two in the morning. And I don't care about people that much."  
"You should!"  
"Okay, maybe I care about a few people, but only you Avengers and Pepper. But not Natasha because she can deal with herself and if she dies, she dies with my secret so I don't care that much."  
Steve looked shocked. "Tony, you can't just say that! And, what secret?"  
"My medical secret that I haven't told anyone ever except for Natasha who forced me forcefully and I'm not telling you no matter what you say, but speaking of my medical secret its really dark and I've got a really bad headache and I think I'm going to throw up so I'm going now."

Steve looked at Tony, who was walking back into the tower.

"Tony!" He called to the other man, who turned around. "This illness, it's not...it's not life threatening is it?"

Tony shrugged. "Depends, but if I'm careful it won't be."

"Be careful then."


	5. Chapter 5

"Hey, has anyone seen Tony?" Clint asked the group the next day. "He said something about a smashed glass and being a good person last night, but he sounded pretty drunk."  
Steves head snapped up. "Where were you when he told you this?"  
Clint raised an eyebrow. "We were both in the lift at the same time. He was going to the...ground floor."  
Steve sighed. "He threw his glass over the balcony and I told him he should care more. He probably went to check if anyone was hurt like I suggested and passed out on the sidewalk."  
Bruce volunteered to look for him, as they decided Tony would be in pretty bad shape. He went outside, but looking around the tower, he saw no sign of the billionaire. Shrugging, he travelled back up the tower to the other avengers.  
"Didn't find him?" Steve asked when the lift doors opened to reveal only one occupant.  
"No, there was no sign he had even been there, apart from I found the smashed glass. No casualties, then." Bruce sat down with the others. "When do we tell Fury then?"  
Clint, who usually had a tough exterior, looked worried. "Lets give Tony a day, maybe he'll find his own way back.  
The group agreed that was a good idea, and they went about their daily routines. They didn't really remember they had lost Tony until the next morning.  
"Do you think I should take Tony some fo-oh." Steve realised his mistake. "Should we tell Fury now?"  
There came a mix of yesses and nos from the other avengers, but Steve made a decision for them and went to see Fury.

"What do you mean, he's gone missing?" Fury stood up, his chair creating a screech as it slid back.  
"Well, sir, he went out of the tower a few days ago and didn't come back. He was slightly drunk though." Steve was standing stiffly, trying to not show that he was actually quite intimidated by the one eyed man in front of him.  
"Rogers, although it hurts to admit it, we need that motherfucker alive and doing some science shit, so you get every security camera in the state being watched, and send a couple search parties out. I want you avengers to pitch in too."  
Steve sighed, knowing his team mates would not enjoy that news, then quickly stood to attention again.  
"Yes sir, I will get it sorted right away."  
He turned to walk out, but Fury stopped him.  
"Rogers."  
"Yes sir?"  
"The sooner we find him, the better. And preferably alive."  
Steve nodded. "Yes sir." He walked out, closing the door behind him.

"So he didn't flip his shit?" Clint asked eagerly.  
Steve shook his head. "No, he seemed pretty relaxed about it."  
A "goddammit" was heard from the archer, and Steve smirked.  
"Stark has probably gone missing before, seeing as he is drunk at least half the time." Natasha added.  
"I'd say three quarters..." Clint said.  
"Ninety nine percent?" Bruce chipped in.  
"Hey guys, he's not drunk that much of the time...probably...maybe." Steve frowned. "Anyway, you can mock him all you like, Fury has said we have to help look for him."  
"God dammit!"  
"We'll take turns, starting tomorrow." Steve walked out of the room.  
"Well, now Captain killjoy has given us our fun tasks, looks like I will go and get my beauty sleep, which of course I hardly need." Clint left too, leaving Natasha rolling her eyes at his comments.  
"Bruce, I'm headed off to get some rest too. You might want too as well, if we're going to find your..." She raised her eyebrow, "Science bro, or whatever he thinks you guys are."  
Bruce made a face, and followed her out.

Tony opened his eyes slowly and carefully. That small movement was painful and took much more effort than what it should have needed. He glanced around, trying to see what was going on. He was sitting on a chair in front of a window. After trying to stand up, he found that he was tied to the chair and couldn't get his butt more than two centimeters away from the seat. The room wasn't lit, and Tony could tell that it would be pitch black if it weren't for the moonlight coming through the small window. For this, Tony was incredibly thankful, as it gave him a small bit of pain relief.  
The door creaked open slightly, and Tony turned his head to face it.  
"Hello?" he called, his voice croaky so the word coming out as more of a guttural groan or cough. He saw the shape of a person enter his small cell, but because of the absence of light in that part of the room, he couldn't make out any of the features, including whether it was male or female.  
"Mr Stark. The great inventor and self proclaimed philanthropist." Its voice was low and reminded Tony of an engine in an old car that desperately needed help, and although it sounded masculine, it didn't really help with identifying the figure there.  
"You got me." Tony said as loud as he could.  
"I wonder what you are thinking." the voice continued, "Maybe, who is this person? Where am I? Or, am I going to die?"  
Tony shrugged. "You're some crazy guy, I'm in a dark room, and I'm not dead yet. If you wanted me dead, you probably would have killed me already."  
The voice was quiet for a few seconds, as if he was thrown by Tony's answer. It then continued. "Well, whatever you think the answers are, you aren't getting out any time soon."  
Tony raised an eyebrow. "Well, I'm pretty sure my team have noticed I'm missing and are tracking me to your ass right now."  
A cackle came from the dark corner. "Well, Stark. That is where you are wrong. Even if your friends were tracking you, they would have found that you were somewhere in Nebraska, and when they look there they will find you are not, in fact, there. However, if they are going to look for you, they probably would have already done it as it has been days since you went missing and my computer says they haven't even tried to track you. So looks like you will be here for a while longer."  
Tony smiled. "Well, you have just given away some valuable information. I am probably not in Nebraska."


	6. Chapter 6

"I'm fucking freezing." Clint grumbled, dragging his feet through the snow. "Its the middle of winter and we are basically in Canada."  
Steve sighed. "Clint, we are not in Canada, there's two states in the way. And stop complaining, Agent Hill told us they tracked Tony to somewhere around here, so we will keep looking until either we find him or we get frostbite." The soldier shivered, and kept walking. Natasha, who was walking slightly behind Clint, caught up with Steve and stopped him. She could see he was becoming more and more uncomfortable with the cold by the minute.  
"Steve, we've been looking for hours. We should head back to the quinjet and warm up." She had to shout, as the wind and snow combined meant that her words were barely audible.  
"No." He said, forcefully. "It's my fault he's gone, so I'm going to find him." He shivered again.  
"No one is blaming you, Steve. Why don't you keep looking while me and Clint go and get the jet, and we will pick you up?"  
Steve nodded, then turned around, ready for more searching.  
"Steve, keep your communicator on at all times. We don't want..." She trailed off.  
"Yes ma'am." he walked away through the snow, his footprints being covered up quickly by the blizzard falling from the sky.

Tony sat in a dimly lit cell, the metal wall cold against his ripped shirt. He had been moved from the dungeon room a few days ago, and he hadn't heard anything from his captors since. He was sat there, tapping his arc reactor, trying to keep his mind off his growing headache, when he heard a 'fshhh' sound from somewhere, and everything went black.

When he came to, he saw a body on the other side of the cell to him. After regaining control of his body, Tony got up and pushed the man's face back, to see in the light. His eyes grew wide, and he took a step back.  
"No, no...not you, please." He rushed forward again and checked for a pulse, letting out a breath when he found one, slow but still there. "Come on, wake up," he said, shaking the body gently. "Wake up, I need you to be okay...please..." Tony slumped against his wall again, realising the other man wouldn't be waking up any time soon.  
"Please..." he begged. "Be okay...Steve..."

Steve had been unconscious for around half a day longer, and Tony had spent the whole time in agony, not knowing how long it would be able to take, or whether Steve had any injuries that he couldn't see that could be life threatening.  
When the soldier came round, Tony had fallen asleep next to him, and was jolted awake by his avenger colleague.  
"Tony, I thought you were dead!" Steve sighed with relief.  
"You thought I was dead? I thought you were dead! Well, more like were never going to wake up, seeing as you had a pulse..."  
They were going to continue their conversation, when they heard the 'fshhh' sound again.  
"Oh." Tony said drowsily, "Knockout gas again."

He woke up in the dungeon like room again, this time shackled to a wall. He rolled his eyes at the stereotypical-ness of the situation, then tried to look around. He could see the outline of the chair he had been seated on when he had arrived, and the window, but apart from that, there wasn't much to see.  
The heavy wooden door creaked open, and a woman with white-blonde hair walked in. She sat at the chair in front of him, then pulled a butterfly knife out of her pocket, unfolding it.  
"Hello Tony Stark." she said, looking directly at him.  
"Hi there, and you are..?" He raised an eyebrow, not really sure whether she was trying to act tough or not.  
She smiled. "You can call me...hmm, I don't know..." She got up and pressed her knife into his upper arm, drawing blood but not making the cut too deep. She wiped the blood away with her finger, then licked it slightly. "I've tasted better. You can call me Steve, then when you are screaming my name because of the pain, it will be familiar."  
The billionaire raised his eyebrow again. "Are you insinuating me and Steve have had sex, because we haven't and although that does disappoint me slightly, I think his type is more patriotic and female. Also, that was gross."  
The woman, 'Steve', laughed. "Whatever. Anyway, there won't be much screaming today, unfortunately. We'll start easy today, and see if you cooperate. So, first question. What's different in your DNA?"  
In Tony's head, he was racing through the ways this woman could have found out about his secret. Out loud, he said, "Nothing, my genetics are 100% normal."  
The woman smiled her creepy smile again, then drawled, "Oh, really. What happens when I do...this!" The small window was suddenly blocked off and the room was plunged into darkness.  
Tony's headache immediately got worse, but he didn't show his pain. "I don't know what you were expecting." he said to the darkness. "An incredibly bad, genetic phobia of the dark?"  
Suddenly he felt breathing on his face and heard the woman hiss something to him.  
"You're hiding something, Stark. And I'll find out what."  
He heard the door open and close, and was left in the dark. He passed out around an hour later.


	7. Chapter 7

"Okay, Tony, do you have  _any_  idea what they want with us, because we've been here for about a week and I haven't been moved from this cell."  
Tony shrugged, "I know what they want from me, but I have no clue why they've got you. Ten dollars says it's the super serum though."  
The crazy blonde woman had interrogated Tony three times overall, giving him a serum of some sort that made him heal quicker, so the amount of pain she caused him each session could increase. She hadn't mentioned anything about Steve though, apart from a few taunts.  
"Deal. Why have they got you then?"  
"It's about my..." Tony lowered his voice to a whisper, "Genetic... thing."  
Steve waited a second, thinking Tony was going to continue. "Is that it?"  
"Yeah, they're trying to make me tell them what it is and how they can recreate it or something, but I don't see why they would want that."  
Steve looked worried,"Okay, so I've got that it's an illness, symptoms including skin discolouration, blood loss and headaches, and it's connected to light."  
Tony sighed, "I might as well tell you seeing as you've practically guessed it all, basically my dad messed around with a bunch of babies' DNA, including me, to try and make us more like you, I guess, but instead of getting a super soldier he got one son who gets energy from the light."  
"Um, okay...that's pretty bad." Steve was pretty stumped.  
"I guess you could say I'm lucky, only a few survived past five."  
There was an awkward silence while Steve took it all in.  
"I photo- _sympathise_  with you." he said, smiling _._  
"Shut the fuck up." Tony couldn't help but grin.  
"Wasn't your  _celery_ high enough?"  
"These are getting worse."  
"Need to work some over- _thyme_?"  
"Why am I friends with you?"  
"Wanna go on a  _date_?"  
"Sure." Tony shrugged.  
Steve raised an eyebrow, "That was another joke..."  
"No take backs!" He laughed.  
Steve crossed his arms, his face turning grumpy.  
"Oh, you're sulking because  _you_  asked  _me_  on a date! I should be the one sulking because  _I_  was going to ask _you_  on a date, and now I can't!"  
"Why were you going to ask me on a date, you don't even like me!"  
Tony snorted. "I don't like you? One, I saved you from the giant spider, two, I just told you my secret which only two people in the world know, and three, I was going to buy you a fucking dog for your birthday."  
"We always argue though, that's why I never asked you out because I thought you still hated me!"  
"I never hated you Steve!"  
"That's a lie."  
"Yes, that was a lie," This made Steve laugh, "I hated you when I did research and found out that I'm like this because my dad was trying to create another you, and also that I was neglected by him because he was trying to find you in the ice constantly."  
"Um...sorry?" Steve really had no idea what to say.  
"Nah, it's not your fault. I stopped hating you a while ago."  
"Good."  
"Yeah, good."  
"Good good good."  
"Oh, shut up." Tony jumped up and kissed Steve slowly, their lips moving together as if they'd been doing it for years.  
"I just kissed Captain America and we haven't even had our first date." Tony sniggered.  
"Well..." Steve pouted, "You smell."  
"Not surprising, seeing as I've been tortured and holed up in here for like two weeks, and you smell just as bad and you haven't moved."Okay well, looks like you're not getting any more action until we have a date, if that's how you feel." Steve smirked at him and shuffled a couple of centimeters away from Tony.  
"No, I didn't mean it!" Tony looked like he was going to cry. Steve laughed, and pulled Tony closer, leaning in but stopping when he heard the familiar 'fshh'.  
"Fucking now? Really?" Tony rolled his eyes and slumped next to Steve, leaning on his arm and blacking out, the other man falling asleep soon after.

"We heard your little chat with your boyfriend." Tony woke up in the dungeon again, shackled to the wall like the times before, the blonde lady standing in front of him.  
"Really? Which one? We've had many."  
"The one about why we are keeping you here."  
"And why are you keeping us here?" Although Tony was worried and uncomfortable, he decided to play with her a bit in case she was bluffing.  
"You know why we are keeping you here. You said in the cell."  
"Sorry, that gas you use must have mucked up my memory, I have no idea what you are talking about."  
Tony saw her take a deep breath.  
"Tell us your secret or I will kill you."  
"I have no secrets, I am an open book."  
"Tell us your secret, or we will kill Captain America."  
"Look- I said I had no secrets."  
She spun around, producing a knife out of nowhere and holding it against his neck.  
"We know you're hiding something, Tony Stark. And we will stop at nothing to find it out." she hissed, dragging her tongue along his jaw. "Bring him in." she called, the door creaking open and a figure being dragged in and shoved onto a chair,a few meters in front of Tony.  
"So, Captain." The lady walked up to Steve and sat on him, straddling his legs, and drawing her knife across his cheek, creating a small cut. "Wanna tell me a secret?"  
"Sure." Steve lifted his head and Tony could see that his face was bruised. "Your hair colour is horrible." She slapped him hard, on the side with the cut, and Tony, having been through similar situations, could feel his pain. "Look, Steve isn't going to tell you the secret and neither am I."  
"No, Tony, I'll tell her." The woman faced him, immediately curious. "When Tony is in a certain environment, he turns into a sort of animal and won't stop until he's had crazy animal sex with about ten people, preferably at once." Tony snorted and the lady glared, slapping Steve again.  
"Certain environment, more like when I'm drunk." Tony added. "And may I say that was very unlike you, mentioning sex and orgies, it's all getting a bit heated here." The lady growled and Tony and Steve sniggered, having fun winding her up.  
"Hey, bleach blonde, we could be telling the truth!" Tony said, just before she stormed out and slammed the door behind her.

"They've been missing too long, has anyone got any leads as to where those motherfuckers are?" Fury addressed the remaining Avengers, who were sitting around a table.  
"I asked the mighty Heimdall, he could only pinpoint their location to a rough area." Thor said after a short silence.  
"Did no one bother telling me this?" Fury asked, sitting heavily down in a chair.  
"Well, he said they were in the north eastern area of the United States of America, Hawkeye said this was not useful so I did not tell you."  
Fury sent a death glare at Clint, who shrugged.  
The directors phone buzzed and he answered it, putting it on loudspeaker.  
"Hello, Director Fury. I have found the location of Mr Stark and the Captain, and will send you the co-ordinates." came the English accent of J.A.R.V.I.S.  
"Did no one ask J.A.R.V.I.S if he could find them?" Everyone shook their heads or shrugged.  
"You are all dumbass motherfuckers and are on major clean up duty for ever." Fury slammed his head repeatedly on the desk.  
Clint shrugged again.


End file.
